I have to give props to Dennis Chow AKA GlamNation for cluing me on this band. I’d never heard of them until he randomly IMed me some of their songs saying that if I liked Jesus & Mary Chain that I should hear this band from the UK. I was kind of expecting something along the lines of the Crocodiles or A Place to Bury Strangers… you know that heavily fuzzed out shoegazery driven rock… but I’m not sure if that description is accurate for The Blanche Hudson Weekend.

Sure they have that classic 60s Phil Spector inspired rock structure J&MC relied on so heavily and really hit that fuzzed out JM&C sound on “The Last Ride” and the aptly titled “Noise and Fury,” this is a much more delicate band that’s more akin to the delicate twee and dream pop of the Shop Assistants, Marine Girls, Galaxie 500 (a lot) and most recently Frankie Rose & The Outs. Which in no small part is due mainly to the sweet and tender voice of Caroline McChrystal.

The Blanche Hudson Weekend was formed from the ashes of The Manhattan Love Suicides, a band I’ll admit I’m not at all familiar with besides the fact that they’re named after a Richerd Kern film. From their ashes Caroline McChrystal and Darren Lockwood formed The Blanche Hudson Weekend, whose name too references some cinema… this time Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?

Since 2009, all of The Blanche Hudson Weekend’s recorded output have been three 3-song EPs which will soon be collected on the Reverence, Severance and Spite compilation being put out by Squirrel Records sometime in October. This is perfect Fall music that well… you should be listening to.

Hazy, minimal and catchy as the day is long, Cosmetics are a Vancouver duo of Nic M and Aja Emma who specialize in dark and dancey electro tracks perfect for those debauched nights out alone or with friends. This is is Nic and Aja’s first musical endeavor which when you listen to the songs is pretty incredible. “Catchy” must be as second nature to them as breathing.  Any one desperately waiting for their new Johnny Jewel fix, need to look no further than what these guys are doing.

After releasing a couple of dark and glamorous 7″s, including the brand new “Sleepwalking” 7″ on Brooklyn’s own Captured Tracks the band has started building quite a buzz outside their hometown. Alas the 4 total tracks their name are just not enough, But it’s going to have to do until they release their full length later on this year.

For Nic and Aja, Cosmetics is not merely a band but a way of life. The pair are a couple who not only live together but produce all of their music and visuals right from their home studio. Can’t make romantic synth music with out their being some romance and sexual tension now can you? Cosmetics have that in spades.

Take a listen up above to their first single “Black Leather Gloves,” A minimal synth excursions through sinister and sensual underbelly of all things Italo. A 3am anthem for locking eye and lips in a drunken stooper.

Besides a full length on the horizon, Cosmetics are also gearing up for an East Coast tour featuring 3, yes 3 New York City shows! The Captured Tracks showcase at Bowery Ballroom , a headlining gig at Wierd at Home Sweet and a stop at Glasslands for Pendu Disco. You’re not gonna wanna miss these shows!

Those of you who need a Cosmetics fix beyond their four tracks should download their recent mix for Dazed Digital.

I’ve been wanting to post about this shadowy Brooklyn outfit for a couple of months now but I had very little information to go on. No video, news or anything with which to really make a post after I first saw them. But just a short time later that has all changed and Minks are set to be a breakout band for the coming year.

Minks sound can vary a bit from track to track (which is part of the appeal) but they tying it all together is their nose for making very doom and gloom drenched pop. The bands first single “Funeral Song” is as eerily upbeat as they get. It’s new wave jam that sounds to me like a long lost Cure demo with Richard Hell handling the vocals. It’s backed with “Drunk Punks” which has a more of psychedelic tinge.

I’m a sucker for this shit but really whats not to like? You can grab the 7″ for “Funeral Song” along with their just released  7″ “Ophelia” from Brooklyn’s Captured Tracks who are steadily becoming a force to be reckoned withs.

Hopefully that will be enough to hold you over until Minks releases their first full length later this Fall also on Captured Tracks.

In the meantime Minks has been busy playing around New York and I for one could not be happier. They’ve got two shows around NYC set for August. The first is on August 14th at the new Jelly NYC space called The Rock Yard. On August 28th they play what is basically a Captured Tracks showcase at Bowery Ballroom along with Wild Nothing, Cosmetics and Blank Dogs. Both shows are going to be great.

If after reading this you are hooked and just can’t seem to get your fill of Minks then head on over to their website I Am Witchcraft which is chock full of images that band draws inspiration from. It makes for a nice diversion when you’re bored at work.

It’s been more than 30 years since bands like The NY Dolls and The Dead Boys were tearing up downtown clubs with outlandish outfits and nihilistic attitudes. Times have changed since those days, both the music and the neighborhoods that nurtured it have become safer and more family-friendly.

However if you look closely, you can still find some junkies on the Bowery and there a still kids out there who are not afraid to throw on some leather & spikes and play Rock N Roll the way it was meant to be played. Enter New York City’s very own Shapes.

Shapes play raw stripped down pop and are not afraid to wear their influences on their sleeves. The bands latest release is a 5 song EP entitled I Feel… Therefore I Drink that is everything you would expect from a band keeping the glam torch burning bright!

Lead singer “Fanelli” performs with unending energy and somehow manages not to break a leg as he runs, climbs, dives all over the room in heels most women wouldn’t be able to walk in.

Shapes have always got shows coming up in Manhattan and Brooklyn so don’t deny yourself the joys of getting covered in cheap beer and glitter. You know what? There’s actually no reason you should be reading this still… You should be buying their EP, throwing on some leather and getting rowdy on the avenues with your friends.

It was really only a matter of time before a band bridged the past years newest genres together… but what a way to do it! LAKE R▲DIO seamlessly traverse the cosmic slop that is halfway in-between the worlds of Glo-Fi/Chillwave and Witch House. This downtempo electronic approach is equal measure creepy and calming that has a gift of taking you away into it’s own world… like a fantastic acid trip where you still have that sneaking suspicion may turn bad at any minute.

This pet project of 19 year old Illinois native Caden Moore was done as an exploration into the “darker” realm of music and himself.  Prior to forming LAKE R▲DIO, Caden sang and played guitar in Heavy Ghost (for whom he still plays) and sometimes released solo stuff under the name The Sky Operator. Citing dreams as the biggest driving force for LAKE R▲DIO, it’s no wonder his songs have an other-worldly charm, an inverse familiarity like hearing or seeing in a dream.

Almost all of LAKE R▲DIO’s  samples come from VHS recordings, cassette tapes, some vinyl and even YouTube videos which help explain the well worn and even sinister intimacy all of the songs posses. In many ways for Caden, his LAKE R▲DIO songs are almost reincarnations of audio that had once existed in a new body of sound.

So is LAKE R▲DIO Witch House? Glo-Fi? Both? Or is it something all together new and different? Caden believes his songs share more in common with instrumental Hip-Hop than anything else but admits that he is influenced by and draws from the recent Witch House scene sprouting up around him. However you want to think of these songs, there is no denying their haunting beauty as somehing fresh and exciting.

LAKE R▲DIO currently have a full length album in the works due out before the end of the summer. But in the meantime you should snatch up both of his excellent EPs, The Weather available FREE at Bandcamp and Blair via mediafire.

There’s absolutely no way I could pass up not at least checking out a band calling it self “Craft Spells”… such a great name! I have to be honest though, I was expecting a gothier band from the name, but what I got was more than alright with me. I don’t really know too much about the band besides that they hail from Stockton, California and are seemingly a one-man project from Justin Vallesteros. They have a handful of songs up on their Soundcloud along with a downloadable single for “The Fog Rose High.”

Craft Spells make ifantastic bedroom pop that is one part 80′s New Romantic and another part Dream Pop. People enamored with Glo-Fi/Chillwave should also take not because their production and use of synths will be right up your alley if not entirely hanging ten on top of the Chillwave. “The Fog Rose High” wouldn’t be out of place in an 80′s John Cusack movie, you know in that scene where he and the girl finally “fall in love.” Or “Azalea” which channels a fantastic Stephin Merritt (sans the baritone) at the beach in a most pleasant way. Really, really great stuff.

Craft Spells seems to be working towards their debut album, Idle Labor who release for late June has come and passed. After sitting with these songs for a bit now, I’m excited to hear what Justin Vallesteros has up his sleeves for a longplayer. Hopefully we won’t have to wait too much longer for it since these songs make a perfect soundtrack to the last throws of Summer.

Azalea by Craft Spells

I’ve posted about Blackbird Blackbird before. They came on my radar when they made a video for their cover of Modest Mouse’s “Float On.” Well that was just the opening salvo in what i’m sure will be their climb up the chillwave ranks because they’ve gone and just released their debut LP,  Summer Heart. For the release band compiled this album together from new songs and previously released tracks from their two EPs (which are free to download).

The band who hail from San Francisco, are really just the brainchild of a very young guy who goes by the name Mikey S. Mikey handles the vocals, synths and samples in creating simple synth odysseys that are some of the most sincere Glo-Fi Pop I’ve heard. Just take a listen to their new single “So Sorry Girl” (below) off of Summer Heart and tell me that doesn’t just capture “a Summer crush” perfectly. I dare ya!

Unlike their EPs, If you want Summer Heart, you’ll have to purchase it. But I think it’s worth the $10 investment. Blackbird Blackbird are definitely the best new band I’ve heard all year to throw their hat into the Glo-Fi/Chillwave ring. In addition to his own tracks Mikey S. has also been busy remixing, check the fruits of his labor with this this great remix of Twin Sister’s “Lady Daydream.”

With steady updates of their Tumblr and Bandcamp, Blackbird Blackbird are growing their own small army of fans that will help this band slowly but surely take over the blogosphere in no time! I mean hell, Converse have already jumped on him so who knows, he may be part of their next “create a song campaign.” So hop board the Hype Express now and get a good seat!

I don’t think they’ve played out much if at all and judging from this interview if they do it’ll just be local to the Bay Area for the time being. Now the waiting game begins for when Pfork decides to either blow them up or take them down…

God how I love this band, let me count the ways? One: they’re named after Philip K. Dick’s schizophrenic sci-fi odyssey which happens to be one of my favorite books. Two: Tom of Finland, Sly Stallone and Kurt Russel images all over their Myspace? Um fuck yeah? And three: Their sound… sweet sweet EBM, how I love thee.

Hailing from Chicago, which seems to be undergoing a sort of “Wax Trax” dance reassurance, Valis bring the pulsating thump and the funk to the dance floor that I just can’t ever get enough of. I wish I could give you more info on who is behind the band, but I unfortunately don’t have that information. Judging from the vocals they’re at least a guy/girl combo hell bent on whipping the club into submission.

Valis have 4 tracks for download on Soundcloud, each amazing and better than the last. I can’t help but think that as we head closer to the Armageddon we’ll know more and more about this great band. I just hope they keep leaking new tracks in the meantime. Valis if you’re reading, don’t stop making new tracks, ever!

I found PKE over on All, Everyone, United not too long ago and was kind of instantly drawn in by the re-appropriated used of the Unknown Pleasures graphic and from what I assume is that they’re named after a PKE Meter (Ghostbusters anyone?) So that kind of got me on the hook and I decided to give them a listen.

PKE have a bandcamp where you can either purchase their album A Typical Deviation for $2 or you can just download each track individually via your email for free. I guess it depends how cheap you are or if parting with $2 is saving you 15 minutes. I was cheap by the way, in case you were wondering!

Whichever route you go you’re going get a pretty solid piece of crunchy Electronica that has shades of Electro, EBM, some of that newfangled Glo-Fi thing and a lot of video game soundtracks. I’ve been playing the album in and out over the past few weeks and am really liking it.

From some digging (read googling) I’ve figured out that PKE is the brainchild of Miami native, Andrew J. Herrero who is also in a band by the name of The Mauxms (oddly enough, they follow Greg on twitter) who are considerably departure from what PKE sound like.  Anyway I hope Andrew (whoever he is) chooses to pursue this whole PKE thing and that this isn’t a one off release.

How awesome of a name is Police Academy 6? Come on seriously!? It’s both retarded and amazing all at the damn time. Sadly the actual film Police Academy 6: City Under Siege isn’t one of the good Police Academy flicks… there’s no Mahoney. But it was directed by a guy named Peter Bonerz! Dude’s actual last name is “Bonerz,” again both retarded and amazing. But I digress… back to the band.

Police Academy 6 refer to themselves as a a six piece all female lesbian jazz-funk group active in the 70s which of course isn’t true. But then again I have absolutely zero clue who is behind the band or where they’re from. They’re a total mystery, so the whole lesbian jazz thing may as well be true.

Here’s what I do know:  Police Academy 6 (the band) is all sorts of warm electronic nostalgia. It’s easy to just lump them in with the whole Chiilwave/Glo-Fi thing but truthfully they’re a whole lot more atmospheric and soundtrack oriented. Like music to score the warm glow of something that’s a cross between bad late night television and an acid trip. Listen to “Gallow” and tell me this song wasn’t written as a score to a bad cop flick. Or try and resist the urge to groove along with the aerobics video funk of “Apollo” (which features a sample of Grace Jone’s “Pull Up to the Bumper”).

I just know these dudes are Tim & Eric fans, I just do! Why? Because these songs sound like they could soundtrack some of their sketches. Well that and they have a still of Pierre in their myspace gallery, but even before I saw that knew they were T&EASGJ! fans. Just sayin’.

Police Academy 6 have a self-titled EP that you can download for FREE and carry this lit bit of warm weirdness with you everywhere you go on your iPod. By the way, if anyone knows any more information about Police Academy 6, post it in the comments.

Download Police Academy 6 – S/T EP

P.S. I want more info on the band not the movie you wisenheimers!